This show was performed in Chicago at the VICTORYGARDENSBIOGRAPHTHEATERJanuary 25–March 11, 2012
Thursday-Saturday at 8pm
Sunday at 4pm.

And in New York City at59E59 TheatersJune 1 – July 1, 2012

The Hunchback Variations is “a moving meditation on collaboration and the creative process.” –Jack Helbig, Chicago Reader, on the play’s 2001 debut

“This is not the stuff of standard theater, much less standard opera. It is the stuff of an absurdist masterpiece.” —Chicago Stage Review’s Venus Zarris, on a 2011 workshop production of The Hunchback Variations Opera

“Cerebral, comic, and just plain weird,” St. Louis Post-Dispatch, 2002) Mickle Maher‘s The Hunchback Variations (2001) has been one of the most successful productions in Oobleck’s 23-year history—presented to critical acclaim over the last decade in Chicago, St. Louis, Washington D.C., and Hamburg, Germany.

The Hunchback Variations takes the form of a panel discussion between Quasimodo, hunchback of Notre Dame, and Ludwig van Beethoven, composer, on their attempt to create a mysterious sound effect called for in Anton Chekhov’s The Cherry Orchard. Playing out over 11 scenes, or “variations,” the story details the duo’s collaboration—one doomed by their mutual deafness, their unpleasant working conditions, and the fact that Beethoven has not yet finished reading the The Cherry Orchard.

A deft deconstruction of the creative process, and a fearless investigation of artistic collaboration, Hunchback is driven by questions about the nature of music and sound and performance. So, what could be more natural than to throw it fully – collaboratively!—into the embrace of music and sound and performance by giving it over to the wildly innovative mind of composer Mark Messing, the genius behind the scores of numerous Redmoon productions, and co-founder of the mad, brilliant marching band, Mucca Pazza?

This project is supported in part by an award from the National Endowment for the Arts

*Quick ticket explanation: You can get your “more if you’ve got it, free if you’re broke” tickets (as per Theater Oobleck tradition) by calling the box office 773-871-3000. For on-line tickets, click on the link above, then click on the day you want. Then in the next screen you indicate how many tickets you want. Then in the NEXT screen you are given the option of a “Regular Price” (that would be $20), a $10, or a $1 ticket.

photo by Jim Newberry

Mark Messing

Mark Messing is cofounder of Mucca Pazza, a 30 piece mobile orchestra/marching band and Opera-Matic which performs Lullaby Parades on bicycle powered floats in Chicago neighborhoods at twilight. Recently he wrote new music for the Tony Kushner translation of Mother Courage performed by the Bricklayers Theater, music for Chicago Children’s Theater’s The Houdini Box based on the book by Brian Selsnick and music for The Thief of Bagdad for The Ljubljana Puppet Theater. He has also composed for Redmoon, Lookingglass Theater, Walkabout Theater, Lucky Plush Dance Company, Shirley Mordine and Company, and for numerous independent films including The First Breath of Tengan Rei (2009) by Junko Kajino and Ed M. Koziarski.

photo by Kristin Basta

Mickle Maher

Mickle Maher is a cofounder of Chicago’s Theater Oobleck and the author of numerous plays, including An Apology for the Course and Outcome of Certain Events Delivered by Doctor John Faustus on This His Final Evening; The Hunchback Variations; The Strangerer; Spirits to Enforce; Cyrano (translator); The Cabinet; and Lady Madeline. His plays have appeared Off-Broadway and in numerous theaters around the world. He has been the recipient of a Creative Capital grant (for The Strangerer) and, recently, an NEA grant to for The Hunchback Variations Opera, and a MAP Fund grant (through Catastrophic Theatre) to write a play about a man with a talking hand. He currently teaches play writing and related subjects at the University of Chicago, and Columbia College. For the University of Chicago he is adapting Stanislavski’s An Actor Prepares for production at the university’s Logan Cultural Center in 2012. His plays are published by Hope and Nonthings.

Larry Adams

Larry Adams – has worked in various musical styles throughout his career. He has performed a number of musical genres, including opera, musical theatre, pop and minimalism. Companies with which he has worked include: Drury Lane Theatre, Light Opera Works, Theatre at the Center, Lyric Opera of Chicago, Lincoln Center, La MaMa, Chicago Shakespeare Theatre, Michigan Opera Theatre, Lake George Opera, Fulton Theatre, Pennsylvania Opera Theatre, among others. He has performed on Broadway in The Phantom of the Opera, and has toured Nationally in various productions. Larry was an original member of The Cummings Ensemble, a minimalist group featured on the CRI Label; which performed throughout New York City and the country. He is delighted to be a part of this exceptional piece created by Mark Messing and Mickle Maher, and is proud to share the stage with George, Tim and Paul.

Tim Lenihan

Tim Lenihan is a freelance pianist/keyboardist in Chicago. He has played in the pit orchestras for Wicked, Billy Elliot (Oriental Theater), The 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee (Drury Lane Water Tower), Mame, Miss Saigon, Spamalot, Aida (Drury Lane Oakbrook), and Aladdin (Chicago Shakespeare Theater). Tim has also served as music director for Five Guys Named Moe (Fleetwood Jordain Theater), and Penny Serenade (Towle Theater). He has also worked as an accompanist for vocalists at the Lyric Opera Center for American Artists. As an orchestral pianist, Tim has performed with Elgin Symphony, Northwest Indiana Symphony, New Philharmonic, Chicago Sinfonietta and Civic Symphony Orchestras.

Paul Ghica

Romanian cellist Paul Ghica began studying cello with his father at the age of eight. He spent his formative years in Los Angeles under the tutelage of Corneliu Rădulescu, before moving to Chicago. At fifteen, he played in concert with Emanuel Ax, and soon afterwards made his solo debut with the Merit Chamber Orchestra.

Paul brings with him his chamber music experience as a member of the Van Buren Quartet, Trio Sfacciato, and the Millennium Chamber Players. He has also served as co-principal cellist of the Civic Orchestra of Chicago, and collaborated with Yo-Yo Ma’s Silk Road Project. Today, he teaches at Logos School of Music, serves on the board of directors of the Chicago Cello Society, and can be heard honing his craft at The Peninsula or on 98.7 WFMT.

An active proponent of versatility in music, Paul enjoys a diverse career as a cellist, “jamming” regularly with groups outside the realm of classical music. He appears regularly anywhere from local churches to the House of Blues, and records regularly for pop, rock, and Christian albums.

Paul received his Bachelor of Music in Cello Performance from the Music Conservatory at Roosevelt University.

George Andrew Wolff

George Andrew Wolff (Beethoven), tenor, is thrilled to be working on such an exciting new collaboration. Opera and Theatre credits include: A Christmas Story, The Musical (1st National Tour),
Sweeney Todd, Ragtime (Drury Lane Theatre), Guys and Dolls, Hairspray, A Christmas Carol, Light in the Piazza, The Producers, Sunset Boulevard (Marriott Theatre), Die Fledermaus, Yeomen of the Guard, Countess Maritza (Light Opera Works), Willy Wonka and The Emperor’s New Clothes (Chicago Shakespeare Theater), The 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee (Chicago National), Albert Herring (Monteux Opera Festival), Bon Appetit (Anchorage Opera), Cats (TATC), Treasure Island (Fulton), The Hunchback of Notre Dame (Bailiwick Repertory), Annie Get Your Gun and Camelot (Ravinia Festival) and Side by Side by Sondheim (Light Opera Works Second Stage) for which he earned a Jeff Award Nomination. He is a proud ONU graduate, and this spring, will be seen in Drury Lane’s production of Hairspray. George is grateful to Mark and Mickle and the Oobleck community for welcoming him into their fascinating process.

related items:

The Hunchback Variations Opera (re-christened The Hunchback Variations: A Chamber Opera for its stay on the East Coast) has just completed a very fun and successful month-long run at the wonderful 59E59 Theater in Manhattan. This New York run of the show was produced by Brian W. Parker Productions, in association with Theater Oobleck and 59E59. Thanks Brian! Thanks 59E59!

Mark Blankenship did a wonderful interview with the singers, George Andrew Wolff and Larry Adams, in TDF Stages, linked here, and Playbill covered the gala opening night party here.

The audiences were wonderful, the reviews were terrific. Here are excerpts from and links to some of them.

“Engrossing… Maher’s witty libretto … has been set to deliberative music by Mark Messing that draws out its mysteries in cunning shifts of style, tempo and tone… The Hunchback Variations scores a haunting success while exalting a space for failure.”

“Thoroughly riveting … A remarkably poignant exploration of the painfully ephemeral nature of the artistic process and life itself… Paul Ghica (cello) and Christopher Sargent (piano) play it with beautiful delicacy, while the graceful tenor Wolff and the commandingly powerful bass-baritone Adams glide with precision over some exceptionally tricky melodic lines.”

“Larry Adams as Quasimodo and George Andrew Wolff as Beethoven were great… As usual, Chicago leads the way with some of the most innovative original theatre in the United States today. The Hunchback Variations is an exploration of the artistic process and the tragic humor that often befalls an artist. I’m glad it made its way to New York.”

“It is easy to understand why theaters around the world have produced revivals of Oobleck’s plays. The originality and the profound talent of the actors and musicians are alone worth a visit. That your mind tangles and dissects the fun and the conundrums as both actors sing beautifully is an added treat. In this take in New York, the absurd situation is full of touching and rollicking humor. And the opera is curiously and absurdly moving.”

The Chicago Stage Review liked The Hunchback Variations Opera so much that a second reviewer has weighed in with a second rave review.

J. Scott Hill writes:

“…The Hunchback Variations Opera is a modern masterpiece.

“The premise of The Hunchback Variations Opera is like the beginning of a joke told at a Mensa meeting. Beethoven (who is deaf) and Quasimodo (who is deaf) hold a series of panel discussions about their failed attempts to create a unique sound that neither of them could hear anyway (because they’re deaf)… This is one level of the genius of playwright/librettist Mickle Maher: combining incompatible elements in ways that are absurdly plausible, and readily accessible to a broad audience.

“Enter the musical magnificence of Mark Messing. This is not Maher and Messing’s first dance together; notably, they provided the script and the score for Redmoon Theater’s signature show, The Cabinet. Messing’s score for two voices, piano, and cello allows for the interpretive power of these four voices to be fully realized without the fetters of over-orchestration. There are the clear influences here of Igor Stravinsky, Aaron Copland, and Philip Glass, without seeming derivative. Pianist Tim Lenihan and cellist Paul Ghica are less like musicians and more like puppeteers, making their instruments sing and emote in voice and in silence.

“The Hunchback Variations Opera is funny and frustrating and absurd and poignant. The Hunchback Variations Opera is the most unlikely confluence of heterogeneous incompatibilities to ever work perfectly together onstage. Without doubt, The Hunchback Variations Opera is the DO NOTMISS production of the year in Chicago.

Oobleck’s recently extended production of The Hunchback Variations Opera continues to get rave notices from Chicago’s theater bloggers. Here we feature J.Scott Hill for the Chicago Stage Review and Rebecca Green from Chicago3Media.

Chicago Stage Review writes: “Enter the musical magnificence of Mark Messing… Messing’s score for two voices, piano, and cello allows for the interpretive power of these four voices to be fully realized without the fetters of over-orchestration. There are the clear influences here of Igor Stravinsky, Aaron Copland, and Philip Glass, without seeming derivative. Pianist Tim Lenihan and cellist Paul Ghica are less like musicians and more like puppeteers, making their instruments sing and emote in voice and in silence.

“The Hunchback Variations Opera is funny and frustrating and absurd and poignant… Without doubt, The Hunchback Variations Opera is the DO NOTMISS production of the year in Chicago. The Hunchback Variations Opera should be extended and re-extended for months, but you cannot take that chance. BUYYOURTICKETSNOW.”

Chicago3Media writes: “Maher and composer Mark Messing bring us the inconceivable, side-stitching story of a doomed collaboration in this gem of new musical theater… Theater Oobleck has struck gold with this absurdist romp through time and space and reality and fantasy… I haven’t laughed so hard at the theater in a long time.”

The website ChiILmama.com (dedicated to adventures in urban-odd ball-off the wall-alternative-eco-punk parenting in Chi, IL) highly recommends Oobleck’s The Hunchback Variations Opera, saying it “is truly a masterpiece that’s been percolating for the 23 years of Oobleck’s existence, waiting to see the light of day. It’s quirky and deep, hilarious and moving… This piece is right on so many levels; intellectual without being intimidating.” (Full review here.)

ChiIL Mama also interviewed Mark Messing about his concurrent musical project, The Houdini Box, an adaptation of Brian Selznick’s book at Chicago Children’s Theater. (Selznick is also the author of The Invention of Cabret ; the production is directed and designed by frequent Oobleck collaborator Blair Thomas.) During the interview Mark discussed the experience of writing the score for both shows simultaneously. Click here for the video excerpt of that interview.

“Oobleck [is] a company that works without a director — some of their shows have one or two people, and some have fifty, and yet somehow they come together as finely-tuned, choreographed, and presented as an orchestra concert led by Ricardo Muti… These guys are afraid of nothing…

“Mark Messing has created a musical world with Paul Ghica, cello; Tim Lenihan, piano; a wonderful tenor, George Andrew Wolff, as Beethoven; and an excellent mature basso, Larry Adams as Quasimodo… You will hear music that challenges and pleases, that questions and underscores the debate and discussion.”

Jonathan Abarbanel gives The Hunchback Variations Opera his “Pick of the Week” during the “Dueling Critics” segment on WBEZ’s 848 program:

“It is a dark comedy which has the delicious premise of having two stone-cold deaf people discussing the glories and wonders of sound. And the two people are Ludwig van Beethoven… and the fictional bell-ringer Quasimodo…

“Messing’s music preserves all of the wit of Maher’s original play, and deepens the characters…

“The result is as serious as it is silly, with Messing’s music amping up the stakes with its contrapuntal vocals… Wolff and Adams find a remarkable range from glib comedy to soulful sorrow in their characters’ variations. Maher’s text, while reveling in its own absurdities, slowly becomes a worthy meditation on the irresistible and often frustrating character of the creative impulse—and the subsuming nature of creative failure. Though the staging is simple, the operatic sweep feels apropos.”

“In The Cherry Orchard, Anton Chekhov’s melancholy comedy about a family of Russian aristocrats who lose their estate, there appears one of the most famous passages in dramatic literature. It’s not a speech or a bit of dialogue but a stage direction: “Suddenly there is a distant sound, as if from the sky: the sound of a breaking string—dying away, sad.” This odd, abstract, almost metaphysical sound effect, symbolizing the imminent end of a way of life, has challenged directors and designers since the play’s 1904 premiere, a few months before Chekhov’s own death from tuberculosis.

“The Hunchback Variations Opera takes its inspiration from that enduring dramaturgical koan, What is the sound of one string breaking? The 75-minute one-act from Theater Oobleck posits an attempt by two well-known musical artists to produce the ultimate aural embodiment of Chekhov’s elusive noise. The setting is an academic conference at which the pair are presenting the result of their labors.

“The effort seems to have been doomed from the start. For one thing, both collaborators are deaf. For another, it’s hard to imagine how they could ever have met. One is Beethoven, the composer, who’s been dead since 1827. The other is Quasimodo, the hunchbacked, 15th-century bell ringer of Notre Dame Cathedral in Paris—and a fictional character invented by Victor Hugo in an 1831 novel.

“The setup is quintessential Oobleck—smart, eccentric, unpredictable, thought-provoking, and very funny. Since they arrived in Chicago 23 years ago, the itinerant ensemble—which takes its name from a Dr. Seuss book, Bartholomew and the Oobleck—has specialized in original works based on incongruous cultural cross-references…

“Written by composer Mark Messing and librettist Mickle Maher, and based on a 2001 play by Maher, The Hunchback Variations Opera is just what the title says it is: an opera, albeit a small one. It takes the form of 11 variations on the theme of artistic experimentation and failure, each of which Messing skillfully couches in its own musical style. The score is generally atonal and mildly dissonant, but there are some simple, lovely, melodic passages.

“The singing is beautiful. George Andrew Wolff’s bright tenor contrasts effectively with Larry Adams’s round, chesty bass, and both singers have first-rate diction so the text is always clear. The counterpoint between Wolff’s cheerful, well-groomed Beethoven and Adams’s morose, grotesque Quasimodo is mirrored by the bold give-and-take of pianist Tim Lenihan and cellist Paul Ghica…

“What’s never made clear is how exactly the experiment failed. The omission, of course, is deliberate. Maher and Messing make clear that, in art, failure itself is a failed notion. In the manner of other fringe theaters—and contrary to an increasing emphasis on competition in the performing arts, as the media celebrate the “winners” and “losers” of meaningless talent contests and mindless awards shows—Oobleck renders the concept of failure and success moot. The Hunchback Variations Opera, like The Cherry Orchard, is a meditation on futility. But Hunchback celebrates its characters’ aspirations, prizing process over product and championing the quixotic urge to create and to collaborate in a world that’s inhospitable to both.”

Full review is here — but spoiler alert, if gives away a few of the jokes.

John Dalton writes: “This is a masterful work. Chicagoans should feel greatly privileged to have such artists in our midst. It would be very easy for this show to get overlooked amidst the flood of winter offerings from innumerable theater companies occupying innumerable black boxes about the city. Though I hate to encourage you to ignore any of them, please think about making this show a priority. Theater Oobleck shows are rare, but they are all gemstones; this is no exception. Please see it while you have the chance.”